RESEARCH Open Access Temporal variation of ecosystem carbon pools along altitudinal gradient and slope: the case of Chilimo dry afromontane natural forest, Central Highlands of Ethiopia Mehari A. Tesfaye 1* , Oliver Gardi 2 , Tesfaye Bekele 1 and Jürgen Blaser 2 Abstract Quantifying the amount of carbon pools in forest ecosystems enables to understand about various carbon pools in the forest ecosystem. Therefore, this study was conducted in the Chilimo dry afromontane forest to estimate the amount of carbon stored. The natural forest was stratified into three forest patches based on species composition, diversity, and structure. A total of 50 permanent sample plots of 20 m × 20 m (400 m 2 ) each were established, laid out on transects of altitudinal gradients with a distance of 100 m between plots. The plots were measured twice in 2012 and 2017. Tree, deadwood, mineral soil, forest floor, and stump data were collected in the main plots, while shrubs, saplings, herbaceous plants, and seedling data were sampled inside subplots. Soil organic carbon (SOC %) was analyzed following Walkely, while Black’s procedure and bulk density were estimated following the procedure of Blake (Methods of soil analysis, 1965). Aboveground biomass was calculated using the equation of Chave et al. (Glob Chang Biol_20:3177–3190, 2014). Data analysis was made using RStudio software. To analyze equality of means, we used ANOVA for multiple comparisons among elevation classes at α = 0.05. The aboveground carbon of the natural forest ranged from 148.30 ± 115.02 for high altitude to 100.14 ± 39.93 for middle altitude, is highest at 151.35 ± 108.98 t C ha -1 for gentle slope, and is lowest at 88.01 ± 49.72 t C ha -1 for middle slope. The mean stump carbon density 2.33 ± 1.64 t C ha -1 was the highest for the middle slope, and 1.68 ± 1.21 t C ha - 1 was the lowest for the steep slope range. The highest 1.44 ± 2.21 t C ha -1 deadwood carbon density was found under the middle slope range, and the lowest 0.21 ± 0.20 t C ha -1 was found under the lowest slope range. The SOCD up to 1 m depth was highest at 295.96 ± 80.45 t C ha - 1 under the middle altitudinal gradient; however, it was lowest at 206. 40 ± 65.59 t C ha -1 under the lower altitudinal gradient. The mean ecosystem carbon stock density of the sampled plots in natural forests ranged from 221.89 to 819.44 t C ha -1 . There was a temporal variation in carbon pools along environmental and social factors. The highest carbon pool was contributed by SOC. We recommend forest carbon- related awareness creation for local people, and promotion of the local knowledge can be regarded as a possible option for sustainable forest management. Keywords: Carbon stock density, Dry afromontane natural forest, Deadwood, Humus, Herbaceous, Mineral soil and stump carbon © The Author(s). 2019 Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. * Correspondence: meharialebachew25@gmail.com 1 Ethiopian Environment and Forest Research Institute (EEFRI), Box 24536 code 1000, Gurd Shola, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Full list of author information is available at the end of the article Journal of Ecology and Environment Tesfaye et al. Journal of Ecology and Environment _#####################_ https://doi.org/10.1186/s41610-019-0112-9